Suspicious baby deaths 'feed stem-cells market'

CONOR SWEENEY IN MOSCOW
The Scotsman
Dec. 13, 2006

NEW-BORN babies who died in suspicious circumstances in the Ukraine are being used as a source for stem cells, a campaign group has claimed.

The group has passed on video footage it believes will back up its long-held suspicions to the Strasbourg-based Council of Europe, which is investigating the claims.

The National Ukrainian Federation of Multiple-child Families triggered international attention when it suggested last year that organs and possibly live babies were being taken and sold through Ukrainian hospitals.

It reports that some mothers fear healthy babies were taken from them at birth, either to be trafficked abroad, or possibly murdered so their organs could be removed. The campaigners believe video footage of exhumed infant corpses indicates that their dismemberment was not compatible with a normal post-mortem.

Instead, it suggests that missing body parts were removed and sold while stem cells may also have been extracted from the infants' bone marrow for medical research.

Ukrainian health officials have vehemently denied the accusations.

The Council of Europe has two investigations, looking at the country's general human rights record and the baby organ issue.